We all know friends who are facing deep suffering. This doesn’t surprise us; suffering is part of living in a broken world. But we love our friends, and we hate watching them suffer. We want to help them, but often don’t know how. But if we don’t know what to pray, we can use the prayers of other believers to guide us. I shared in my previous article that Paul’s prayer for the Colossian church is a helpful place to start (Colossians 1:9-12). We saw how Paul challenges our approach to prayer; instead of asking God to remove suffering, he prays that believers will know God better and be obedient to him in and through their suffering. He doesn’t stop there though, he prays for so much more.
Pray that God would Empower your Friend who is Suffering
The Christian life is not easy. We live counter-cultural lives which often brings persecution and we are in a daily battle against our will, fighting sin. We can easily be tempted to throw in the towel and give up on the Christian faith. When on top of all this we are also facing deep suffering, it can seem impossible to press on. The apostle Paul is not ignorant of this temptation and so he prays for the Colossians that they will ‘have great endurance and patience.’ (Colossians 1:11).
Paul prays that no situation will rock our confidence in God’s promises.
He prays that they will keep on keeping on, no matter how hopeless things may be and no matter how long it may take for things to get better. He prays that no situation will rock their confidence in God’s promises. The Devil knows our weaknesses and he wants to crush our friends in their suffering. He wants our friends to doubt God; his goodness, faithfulness and love.
So, we need to pray that God will empower our friends to persevere in their faith as they suffer.
Only God can Empower your Friend
What is it that our friends need in order to persevere? Do they need to conjure up power from inside themselves? No, Paul says the power your friend needs to patiently endure comes from God Himself. Your friend needs God’s power! We need to pray that our friends, like the Colossians, would be ‘strengthened with all power according to his (God’s) glorious might’ (Colossians 1:11). Pray that God would give your friends His power to endure.
When we pray for God’s power to work in someone’s life, we are not asking for Him to give them a puny extra push. We are asking that the very power God used to create the world, the very power He uses to send lightening and earthquakes, the very power that raised Jesus from the dead would empower them to hang onto Jesus. If our friends have this power at work in them, they have everything they need to persevere in their hardships. They will have victory, how could they not?
So, this is what we pray: Almighty God, please fill my friend with Your power so that she can patiently endure in her suffering.
Pray that your Friend would Continue to be Thankful
Suffering tends to cloud our view on things! Our problems become very big and we stop noticing the good things, the things to be thankful for. Paul is aware of this and so he ends his prayer for the Colossians, by praying that they will be thankful. He prays that they would give joyful thanks to the Father in all things (Colossians 1:12). We have so much to be thankful for as believers. We are the ones who have been qualified ‘to share in the inheritance of his (God’s) holy people in the kingdom of light.’ (Colossians 1:12). We don’t deserve anything good from God, and yet God has given us the greatest gift of all: citizenship in his eternal kingdom! We forget these wonderful truths when we suffer.
Heavenly Father, please give my friend a sustained sense of gratitude in your salvation in the face of loss.
It takes extra effort to be grateful when we are facing hardships but if we can stop and force ourselves to consider the things we are thankful for, it’s incredible how our mood can be lifted and our energy restored. We need to ask God to help our struggling friends keep their suffering in perspective; to remember, how ever difficult it may be, that their suffering is transient in comparison to all the amazing things God has in store for them and to be thankful.
So, this is what we pray: Heavenly Father, please give my friend a sustained sense of gratitude in your salvation in the face of loss.
God does not Waste your Friend’s Suffering
Furthermore, as believers, we know that no suffering is wasted. Paul tells us in his letter to the Roman church that ‘in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.’ (Romans 8:28). All things, includes our times of suffering. God in His wisdom is able to bring good out of the greatest tragedies. In faith, we can even thank God for the sufferings we go through.
So, this is what we pray: Loving Father, please help my friend see all that you have given her in Christ and help her to be thankful even in the midst of her suffering.
So, Pray for those Who are Suffering
Let’s not do our friends the disservice of simply asking God to remove their suffering. Follow Paul’s example and pray that God will be at work in our friends as they walk though suffering. Let’s pray that our friends will be given God’s mighty power to endure their suffering patiently, and let’s pray that they will have grace to see their suffering from God’s perspective and be thankful. When we pray God’s word for others we can know we are praying according to God’s will and we can have confidence that he will do what we ask.
